CBS 2 Vault: Some Chicago area hauntings, as seen in the 1980s
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Halloween is days away, and we reached back into the CBS 2 Vault for some reports on Chicago area hauntings back in the 1980s.
First, you probably know Rick Kogan these days for his work in print and radio – but back in the late 1980s, he was a feature reporter for CBS 2, and he was on the ghost beat around Halloween in 1988. He joined the late Chicago ghost hunter Richard Crowe for a visit to the old and purportedly haunted Red Lion Pub.
The Red Lion Pub as a business was not that old at the time – the English-style pub opened Nov. 16, 1984. But it was located in a frame building at 2446 N. Lincoln Ave. that dated from 1882 – and had previously housed a bar called Dirty Dan's Western Saloon, according to the bar's history page.
"The place was smoke-ridden, rat infested, filthy, grimy, but it was unpleasant" the bar's history page says. "The owner, Dan Danforth was an old, alcohol-sadden, toothless gem, without one redeeming defect."
Red Lion owner John Cordwell took over and turned the space into a sophisticated and very popular English-style pub – known for fish and chips, bangers and mash, good ale, and great conversation. But various claims of hauntings abounded.
For just one example, Sara Jean McCarthy wrote in the "Listing Beyond Forty" Chicago Now blog in 2013 about a female spirit who resided in a women's restroom stall – bringing with her spots of "unnaturally cool still air" and a "very strong scent of lavender" that was out of place at the bar.
McCarthy wrote that the lavender woman was known for dumping plates out of serves' hands, locking the door when someone was inside the bathroom stalls, and even "hysterically shrieking."
The Chicago Bar Project identified some other apparitions spotted at the Red Lion as a "scruffy, swaggering cowboy," and a pair of men – one with dark hair and a beard and the other with blond hair. The blond man purportedly killed the bearded man as the result of a gambling debt, the Chicago Bar Project noted.
Also purported to be spotted at the bar is the spirit of "malicious" former owner Dirty Dan Danforth, who is blamed for an invisible force that shoved current owner Colin Cordwell down the stairs, according to the Chicago Bar Project.
When Kogan visited with Crowe and his ghost hunters in 1988, they had already been on a five-hour tour of assorted haunted sites around Lincoln Park. These included the site outside the Biograph Theater – now home of the Victory Gardens Theater company – where John Dillinger was shot and killed by the FBI in 1934. Also on the list were the site of the St. Valentine's Day massacre on Clark Street and some suburban sites.
At the Red Lion, the ghost hunters were seen on camera saying they felt something.
The Red Lion Pub is still around – at the very same location at 2446 N. Lincoln Ave. – but the original building was torn down several years ago and a new one was built for the pub on the same site. This has not stopped the Red Lion from going on appearing on haunted Chicago lists.
Also in this edition of the CBS 2 Vault, we found a 1984 report by CBS 2's Bob Wallace in which he visited Resurrection Cemetery – purported home to one of the most famous ghosts in the Chicago area.
Resurrection Cemetery is located at 7201 Archer Ave. in southwest suburban Justice. It is the purported final resting place of Resurrection Mary, a hitchhiking ghost who appears on the roadsides along Archer Avenue in the southwest suburbs – and who is famous enough to have her own page on the Chicago History Museum website.
The story of Resurrection Mary's life varies depending on the source, but the Chicago History Museum says the consensus is that she was the victim of an accident in the late 1920s or early 1930s. It might have been a deadly car crash on the way home from a night out dancing, or it might have been a deadly hit-and-run while she was out in the rain, the Chicago History Museum reported.
The Chicago History Museum's Jojo Galvan wrote this week: "Most documented reports of Mary describe her as a young, fashionable blonde woman no older than mid-twenties, wearing a white ball gown, accessories, and hairstyle to match. As the story goes, she typically manifests as a lonely guest at a dance hall, and after a night of dancing, she asks for a ride back home, slipping into the backseat and guiding her driver for the night (usually a man) up Archer Avenue. But by the time the car reaches a local cemetery, Mary vanishes without a trace, leaving nothing more than her ghostly memory."
No, this story did not involve Resurrection Mary getting in the back of our CBS 2 News truck with Bob Wallace and his photographer, having them drop her off at the cemetery, and disappearing. Don't be ridiculous. Wallace visited Resurrection Cemetery during the day, with Dale Kaczmarek, president of the Ghost Research Society.
Kaczmarek claimed that at one point, Resurrection Mary bent the cemetery gate. Two of the high metal bars were discovered bent apart, with "impressions of skin texture marks, fingerprints, and scorch marks" around them, Kaczmarek said.
"This was reported back in August of 1976 by a man that was traveling down Archer Avenue and saw a girl currently locked in the cemetery after hours," Kaczmarek said in the 1984 report. "When a police officer responded to the call, he found the bars pulled apart and bent at a weird angle."
Kaczmarek also took Wallace to another site on his ghost tours – 95th Street and Kean Avenue on the edge of Palos Hills. Kaczmarek said animal ghosts were known to show up at that site – in particular phantom horses and riders.
"There's many reports of all types of ghostly animals all around the Chicagoland area – phantom horses, phantom dogs, and there was actually substantiated reports in recent years of a rash of phantom kangaroos," Kaczmarek told Wallace.
The Ghost Research Society maintains a web page about the 95th and Kean site, along the edge of the Cook County Forest Preserves.
Meanwhile, for something we produced at CBS 2 a little more recently, check out the Chicago Hauntings series with Tony Szabelski of Chicago Hauntings Ghost Tours that ran on CBS News Chicago last year. Watch all the installments below:
1) The Eastland Disaster: On July 24, 1915, the SS Eastland was parked along the Chicago River when it capsized. Ever since, people have reported hearing and seeing apparitions near the site of the disaster, and at the makeshift morgue that later became Harpo Studios.
2) The Liar's Club: The famous bar at 1665 W. Fullerton Ave. has been in business since 1995. You may have seen a band there, or maybe you've just come to have a beer and admire the KISS figurines and fez-hat lamps, among other eclectic décor items. But the building that houses the Liar's Club has seen some gore that isn't about camp and frivolity too, and some have reported seeing ghosts.
3) The Couch Tomb: At the south end of Lincoln Park near the Chicago History Museum, you may have noticed a mausoleum with the name "Couch" carved at the top. What do we really know about it?
4) Hull House: Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr founded the Hull House in 1889 as Chicago's first settlement House. A haunted bedroom, a portal in the courtyard, and a devil baby are among the legends that have surrounded it.
5) Suicide Bridge: Starting just before the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893, the city had a lot of structures built in anticipation of the arrival of the fair. One was a soaring bridge in Lincoln Park that became known as the "Suicide Bridge," and near the site of which there have been some spooky sightings.
6) St. Valentine's Day Massacre: Do only fuzzy romantic feelings come to mind when you think of Valentine's Day? How about if we call it St. Valentine's Day? This is the story of the St. Valentine's Day Massacre at a Lincoln Park garage, and some stories of the paranormal in its wake.
7) L&L Tavern: The L&L Tavern at Clark and Belmont is not necessarily known as a haunted location, but it has been voted "the Creepiest Bar in the USA." There are some specific reasons why, involving two heinous serial killers.
8) H.H. Holmes' Murder Castle: The Englewood branch Post Office now stands at the site where serial killer H.H. Holmes' murder castle became known as a house of gore and horror. This is the story of the Murder Castle, and some reports of the paranormal in the basement of the Post Office.
9) Old Cook County Jail: Long before a firehouse stood at Illinois and Dearborn streets, the first Cook County Jail occupied the site. Many sinister men were executed by hanging there, and there are many stories of sightings of ghosts.
10) Iroquois Theater Fire: On Dec. 30, 1903, 602 people died when the Iroquois Theater downtown erupted in flames. It remains the deadliest single building fire in U.S. history, and there are reports of apparitions at the site to this day.
11) Congress Hotel: The Congress Hotel – officially called the Congress Plaza Hotel & Convention Center – is a striking sight along the Michigan Avenue streetwall downtown. But inside, it is reportedly haunted by all kinds of ghosts – some of people who suffered gruesome deaths, and maybe even one of a past president.
12) NEW -- Luetgert Sausage Factory: Adolph Luetgert was convicted of murdering his wife and dissolve her body in a vat full of chemicals in his factory on Diversey Parkway. And there were accounts going back to the turn of the last century that after that gruesome crime – and after Luetgert had been sentenced to prison and also died – an apparition haunted the old factory.
13) NEW -- Drake Hotel: The Drake has stood regally at the northernmost point on the Magnificent Mile for more than a century as an icon of luxury and high society. It is also known for ghosts.
14) NEW -- John Hancock Center: Chicago ghost experts believe the John Hancock Center is Chicago's most haunted skyscraper. Could it have something to do with a "curse" from an eccentric and dangerous mariner dating back more than a century now?
15) NEW -- Holy Name Cathedral: A 1926 gangland murder right outside Holy Name nearly a century ago left the cornerstone damaged by gunfire - and also purportedly has ghosts still hanging around to this day.